Laboratory management of agents associated with hantavirus pulmonary syndrome: interim biosafety guidelines. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

This report provides interim biosafety guidelines for preventing laboratory-associated infections with agents that cause hantavirus pulmonary syndrome. The guidelines are based on extensive laboratory experience with the other hantaviruses--particularly work involving the use of permissive host animal species--and on the limited experience with a hantavirus recently isolated from deer mice. The guidelines address handling patient-derived specimens, propagating viruses in culture (including viral concentrate preparations), and housing and handling infected animals. These recommendations were developed with the assistance of expert consultants during a meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, Subcommittee on Arbovirus Laboratory Safety, November 2, 1993, in Atlanta.